Method, device and readable storage medium for paging

ABSTRACT

A paging method, a paging device and a readable storage medium thereof are disclosed. The method includes: measuring synchronization signal blocks to obtain signal qualities of the synchronization signal blocks, wherein each synchronization signal block respectively corresponds to at least one of downlink beams, a random access channel resource, and/or a random access preamble; selecting suitable synchronization signal blocks from the synchronization signal blocks based on the signal qualities, wherein the signal qualities of the suitable synchronization signal blocks satisfies a first predetermined condition; and transmitting a RACH resource and/or the random access preamble corresponding to the suitable synchronization signal blocks.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a Continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.16/650,407 filed on Mar. 25, 2020, which is a National Phase of PCTPatent Application No. PCT/CN2017/119211 having International filingdate of Dec. 28, 2017, which claims the benefit of priority of ChinesePatent Application No. 201710880903.7, filed on Sep. 26, 2017. Thecontents of the above applications are all incorporated by reference asif fully set forth herein in their entirety.

FIELD AND BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to communicationtechnology, and in particular relate to a paging method, a paging deviceand a readable storage medium thereof.

In LTE/LTE-A, a core network (CN) may notify base stations of a trackingarea (TA) on which a user equipment (UE) in radio resource control (RRC)idle (RRC_IDLE) state camps to page the UE so as to notify the UE toestablish a connection with a base station of the cell on which the UEcurrently camps. The UE in RRC_IDLE state monitors physical downlinkcontrol channel (PDCCH) during a paging occasion (PO) within a pagingframe (PF). If the UE detects downlink control information (DCI)scrambled by the paging-radio network temporary identity (P-RNTI) whichis transmitted on the PDCCH during the PO, the UE reads a paging recordtransmitted on physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) which isindicated by the DCI so as to check whether its own (the UE's) UEidentity (ID) is included in the paging record, and if so, the UEinitiates the random access procedure to establish the connection withthe base station of the cell currently camping on. The UE in RRC_IDLEstate can use discontinuous reception (DRX) technology to reduce thepower consumption, in which only one PO is monitored in one DRX cycle.

In new radio (NR), the system faces the challenge of fragile radio linksand high penetration loss, as it is envisaged to operate over frequencyrange up to 100 GHz. In order to solve these problems, beamforming isadopted as an essential technique and beam sweeping is proposed toimprove cell coverage. The beam sweeping means that the same signal orchannel is carried by at least two beams and transmitted in at least twotime units (e.g., subframes, time slots, symbols etc.) within one cycle.

In NR, paging messages (including P-RNTI scrambled DCI and pagingrecords) may be transmitted in a beam sweeping manner. Since the corenetwork or anchor base station has no information of the exact locationand the best transmission or reception beam of the UE in RRC_IDLE stateor radio resource control inactive (RRC_INACTIVE) state, astraightforward option is to control all the base stations in the TA ornotification area (NA) to repeat the transmission of paging messages inall beam directions, which consumes a large number of radio resourcesand is inefficient.

In the related art, an indication based paging mechanism is proposed. Insuch method, UEs are divided into a plurality of paging groups includingat least one UE, and each paging group is assigned a paging indicator(PI). The base station transmits the PI in the beam sweeping mannerduring the PO. The UE which has received the assigned PI measures allthe synchronization signal blocks (SS-blocks) which can be received toobtain their signal quality, selects one of the SS-blocks with the bestsignal quality, and responds to the base station utilizing a randomaccess channel (RACH) resource and/or a random access preamblecorresponding to the selected SS-block, and then the base stationtransmits the paging message in the downlink beam(s) corresponding toall the selected SS-block(s). Since the signal quality of the SS-blocksdetected by each UE is related to the radio environment where it (eachUE) is located, the SS-block selected by different UEs in the samepaging group may be quite different, and the base station may need toutilize multiple downlink beams to transmit paging messages, whichresults in a great signaling overhead, especially in the case of a largenumber of UEs in a paging group.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The technical problem to be resolved by the present disclosure is toprovide a paging method as well as a paging device and a readablestorage medium thereof, which are capable of solving the problem in therelated art that UE selects only the downlink beam corresponding to theSS-block with the best signal quality for the subsequent paging messagetransmission and therefore causes a lot of signaling overhead.

In order to solve the above technical problem, a first aspect of thepresent disclosure provides a paging method. The method includes:measuring, by a user equipment, synchronization signal blocks to obtainsignal qualities of the synchronization signal blocks, wherein eachsynchronization signal block respectively corresponds to at least one ofdownlink beams, a random access channel resource, and/or a random accesspreamble; selecting, by the user equipment, suitable synchronizationsignal blocks from the synchronization signal blocks based on the signalqualities, wherein the signal qualities of the suitable synchronizationsignal blocks satisfies a first predetermined condition; andtransmitting a random access channel (RACH) resource and/or the randomaccess preamble corresponding to the suitable synchronization signalblocks.

In order to solve the above technical problem, a second aspect of thepresent disclosure provides a paging device. The device includes aprocessor and a communication circuit, in which the processor isconnected to the communication circuit; and the processor is configuredto execute instructions to implement the method of the first or thesecond aspect of the present disclosure.

In order to solve the above technical problem, a third aspect of thepresent disclosure provides a readable storage medium. The readablestorage medium is stored with instructions, in which the method of thefirst or the second aspect of the present disclosure is implemented whenthe instructions are executed.

The present disclosure has the following advantages: the UE firstlyselects the suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on the signalqualities, and then selects the target SS-block from the suitableSS-blocks based on the specified parameters irrelevant to the UE. Sincethe specified parameters irrelevant to the UE are utilized during theselection, for the UEs which are in the same paging group and located insimilar wireless environment (at least parts of the suitable SS-blocksare the same while the SS-blocks with the best signal quality aredifferent), it is possible to select the same target SS-block in thepresent disclosure while different target SS-blocks in the related art,thereby reducing the number of the downlink beams for transmitting thepaging message.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a flow chart of a first embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 2 is a flow chart of a second embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 3 is a flow chart of a third embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart of a fourth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart of a fifth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 6 is a flow chart of a sixth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of a seventh embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart of an eighth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 9 is a flow chart of a ninth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 10 is a flow chart of a tenth embodiment of a paging method of thepresent disclosure.

FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram of a simulation result of the number ofdistinct responded beams of different beam selection schemes with L=8according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 12 is a schematic diagram of a simulation result of the number ofdistinct responded beams of different beam selection schemes with L=64according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 13 is a flow chart of an eleventh embodiment of a paging method ofthe present disclosure.

FIG. 14 is a flow chart of a twelfth embodiment of a paging method ofthe present disclosure.

FIG. 15 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a first embodiment ofa paging device of the present disclosure.

FIG. 16 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a second embodimentof a paging device of the present disclosure.

FIG. 17 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a first embodiment ofa readable storage medium of the present disclosure.

FIG. 18 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a second embodimentof a readable storage medium of the present disclosure.

DESCRIPTION OF SPECIFIC EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

The technical schemes in the embodiments of the present disclosure willnow be described in conjunction with the accompanying drawings in theembodiments of the present disclosure, and it will be apparent that thedescribed embodiments are merely part of the embodiments of thedisclosure, and are not all embodiments. All other embodiments obtainedbased on the embodiments in the present disclosure by those of ordinaryskill in the art without making creative work are within the scope ofthe present disclosure. Among the following embodiments, thenon-conflicting ones may be combined with each other.

Referring to FIG. 1 , a flow chart of a first embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. An execution main body ofthe first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure is auser equipment (UE). The UE may be fixed or mobile, and may be acellular phone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a wireless modem, atablet computer, a laptop computer, a cordless phone, etc. The methodmay include the following blocks.

At S11: measuring synchronization signal blocks (SS-blocks) to obtainsignal qualities of the SS-blocks.

Each SS-block may include a primary synchronization signal (PSS), asecondary synchronization signal (SSS), and a physical broadcast channel(PBCH). Each SS-block may respectively correspond to at least onedownlink beam as well as a random access channel (RACH) resource and/ora random access preamble. Specifically, each SS-block may be transmittedon its corresponding downlink beam and associated with its correspondingRACH resource and/or preamble. Different SS-blocks correspond todifferent RACH resources and/or random access preambles, and thedownlink beams corresponding to different SS-blocks may be in the samedirection or in different directions.

The signal qualities of the SS-blocks may be related to the UEs. Thatis, for the same SS-block, signal qualities of the same SS-blockmeasured by different UEs may be different.

In this embodiment, the UE is in RRC_IDLE or RRC_INACTIVE state, and theSS-blocks may refer to all the SS-blocks which can be received by theUE.

At S12: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities.

The signal qualities of the suitable SS-blocks may satisfy a firstpredetermined condition. The first predetermined condition may include acondition that the signal quality of each suitable SS-block is greaterthan a predetermined threshold and/or the suitable SS-block belongs to ashortlist of the first n SS-blocks arranged in orders with respect totheir signal qualities, such as in an order from the best quality to theworst quality, in which n is the predetermined maximum number of thesuitable SS-blocks. The first predetermined condition may be storedlocally, or may be transmitted from a base station in advance.

At S13: selecting a target SS-block from the suitable SS-blocks.

Each SS-block may have a specified parameter. A specified parameter ofthe target SS-block may satisfy a second predetermined condition, andthe specified parameter of each SS-block and the second predeterminedcondition may be irrelevant to the UE. That is, for different UEs, thesecond predetermined condition and the specified parameter of eachSS-block received by different UEs may be the same. The secondpredetermined condition may be stored locally, or may be transmittedfrom the base station in advance.

The specified parameter of each SS-block may be a parameter defined by acore network or base station for each suitable SS-block, for example, atleast one of a priority, index, etc. The index of each SS-block may beutilized to distinguish different SS-blocks from each other, and theindices of the SS-blocks corresponding to adjacent beams may beconsecutive. All the SS-blocks in a cell may be divided into at leasttwo groups, the SS-blocks in the same group are assigned with a samepriority, and the SS-blocks in different groups are assigned withdifferent priorities.

The execution of part or all of S11-S13 may be periodic, or benon-periodic, for instance, be triggered upon receiving a pagingindicator (PI).

At S14: transmitting a RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

The paging response message may be configured to instruct the basestation to transmit the paging message utilizing the downlink beamcorresponding to the target SS-block. The base station may confirm thetarget SS-block selected by the UE based on the RACH resource and/or therandom access preamble which carries the paging response message, andfurther select the downlink beam corresponding to the target SS-blockfor the subsequent paging message transmission.

In an indication-based paging process, the base station needs totransmit the PI through a beam sweeping manner and then utilize thedownlink beam corresponding to the target SS-block selected by the UE totransmit the paging message. The overhead of two downlink transmissionsdepends on a grouping mode of paging groups, and there exists a complextrade-off between the overhead of two downlink transmissions and thegrouping mode of the paging groups. Assuming that all the UEs areequally assigned to the paging groups, the fewer the UEs there are ineach paging group, the fewer the downlink beams are needed to transmitthe paging message, and the smaller the overhead of the second downlinktransmission is, meanwhile the more the paging groups there are, thegreater the length of the PI is, and the greater the overhead of thefirst downlink transmission is. Oppositely, the more the UEs there arein each paging group, the more the downlink beams are needed to transmitthe paging message, and the greater the overhead of the second downlinktransmission is, meanwhile the fewer the paging groups there are, thesmaller the length of the PI is, and the smaller the overhead of thefirst downlink transmission is.

Through the implementation of this embodiment, the UE first may selectthe suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on the signal qualities,and then select the target SS-block from the suitable SS-blocks based onthe specified parameters irrelevant to the UE. Since the specifiedparameters irrelevant to the UE are utilized during the selection, forthe UEs in the same paging group and located in similar wirelessenvironment (at least parts of the suitable SS-blocks are the same,while the SS-blocks with the best signal qualities are different), it ispossible to select the same target SS-block in the present disclosurewhile different target SS-blocks are selected in the related art,thereby reducing the number of the downlink beams for transmitting thepaging message, without being affected by the grouping mode of thepaging groups.

For instance, all the SS-blocks in a cell may be divided into twogroups, wherein one group consists of odd-indexed SS-blocks and theother group consists of even-indexed SS-blocks, and the priorities ofthe two groups are different from each other. Adjacent UEs may selectthe same suitable SS-blocks, in which the suitable SS-blocks may includethe SS-blocks corresponding to two adjacent beams, and the adjacentbeams may correspond to the SS-blocks with consecutive indices. Theneighboring UEs may select the same target SS-block based on thepriority.

Referring to FIG. 2 , a flow chart of a second embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes a priority andan index, and the second predetermined condition includes a conditionthat the index of the target SS-block is the smallest when the priorityof the target SS-block is the highest. This embodiment is an extensionof the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,hence the same content as the first embodiment of the paging method ofthe present disclosure is not described again herein. The method mayinclude the following blocks.

At S111: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S112: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities thereof.

At S113: selecting the suitable SS-block(s) with the highest priorityfrom the suitable SS-blocks.

In this embodiment, the highest priority does not refer to the priorityof the SS-block(s) with the highest priority among all the SS-blocks inthe cell on which the UE currently camps, but refers to the priority ofthe SS-block(s) with the highest priority among all of the suitableSS-blocks. For instance, if all the SS-blocks in the cell on which theUE currently camps are divided into three groups A, B, and C, thepriorities are sequentially reduced based on the order of A, B, and C,and the suitable SS-blocks do not include the SS-blocks in the group A,then the suitable SS-block(s) with the highest priority belong to thegroup B.

At S114: determining whether the number of the suitable SS-blocks withthe highest priority is greater than one.

If the number is greater than one, the process proceeds to S115;otherwise, the process proceeds to S116.

At S115: selecting one suitable SS-block with the smallest index fromthe suitable SS-blocks with highest priority as the target SS-block.

The process proceeds to S117.

At S116: taking the suitable SS-block with the highest priority as thetarget SS-block.

At S117: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 3 , a flow chart of a third embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes a priority andan index, and the second predetermined condition includes a conditionthat the index of a target SS-block is the greatest while the priorityof the target SS-block is the highest. This embodiment is an extensionof the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,hence the same content as the first embodiment of the paging method ofthe present disclosure is not described again herein. The method mayinclude the following blocks.

At S121: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S122: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities thereof.

At S123: selecting the suitable SS-block(s) with the highest priorityfrom the suitable SS-blocks.

In this embodiment, the highest priority does not refer to the priorityof the SS-block(s) with the highest priority among all the SS-blocks inthe cell on which the UE currently camps, but refers to the priority ofthe SS-block(s) with the highest priority among all of the suitableSS-blocks.

At S124: determining whether the number of the suitable SS-blocks withthe highest priority is greater than one.

If the number is greater than one, the process proceeds to S125;otherwise, the process proceeds to S126.

At S125: selecting one suitable SS-block with the greatest index fromthe suitable SS-blocks with highest priority as the target SS-block.

The process proceeds to S127.

At S126: taking the suitable SS-block with the highest priority as thetarget SS-block.

At S127: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 4 , a flow chart of a fourth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes a priority andan index, and the second predetermined condition includes a conditionthat the index of a target SS-block is the smallest while the priorityof the target SS-block is the lowest. This embodiment is an extension ofthe first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,hence the same content as the first embodiment of the paging method ofthe present disclosure is not described again herein. The method mayinclude the following blocks.

At S131: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S132: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities.

At S133: selecting the suitable SS-blocks with the lowest priority fromthe suitable SS-blocks.

In this embodiment, the lowest priority does not refer to the priorityof the SS-block(s) with the lowest priority among all the SS-blocks inthe cell on which the UE currently camps, but refers to the priority ofthe SS-block(s) with the lowest priority among all of the suitableSS-blocks.

At S134: determining whether the number of the suitable SS-blocks withthe lowest priority is greater than one.

If the number is greater than one, the process proceeds to S135;otherwise, the process proceeds to S136.

At S135: selecting one suitable SS-block with the smallest index fromthe suitable SS-blocks with lowest priority as the target SS-block.

The process proceeds to S137.

At S136: taking the suitable SS-block with the lowest priority as thetarget SS-block.

At S137: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 5 , a flow chart of a fifth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes a priority andan index, and the second predetermined condition includes a conditionthat the index of a target SS-block is the greatest while the priorityof the target SS-block is the lowest. This embodiment is an extension ofthe first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,hence the same content as the first embodiment of the paging method ofthe present disclosure is not described again herein. The method mayinclude the following blocks.

At S141: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S142: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities.

At S143: selecting the suitable SS-blocks with the lowest priority fromthe suitable SS-blocks.

In this embodiment, the lowest priority does not refer to the priorityof the SS-block(s) with the lowest priority among all the SS-blocks onthe cell in which the UE currently camps, but refers to the priority ofthe SS-block(s) with the lowest priority among all of the suitableSS-blocks.

At S144: determining whether the number of the suitable SS-blocks withthe lowest priority is greater than one.

If the number is greater than one, the process proceeds to S145;otherwise, the process proceeds to S146.

At S145: selecting one suitable SS-block with the greatest index fromthe suitable SS-blocks with lowest priority as the target SS-block.

The process proceeds to S147.

At S146: taking the suitable SS-block with the lowest priority as thetarget SS-block.

At S147: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 6 , a flow chart of a sixth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes a priority, andthe second predetermined condition includes a condition that thepriority of a target SS-block is the highest or the lowest. Thisembodiment is an extension of the first embodiment of the paging methodof the present disclosure, hence the same content as the firstembodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure is notdescribed again herein. The method may include the following blocks.

At S151: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S152: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities.

At S153: selecting the suitable SS-block(s) with the highest priority orthe lowest priority from the suitable SS-blocks.

In this embodiment, the highest priority or the lowest priority does notrefer to the priority of the SS-block(s) with the highest priority orthe lowest priority among all the SS-blocks in the cell on which the UEcurrently camps, but refers to the priority of the SS-block(s) with thehighest priority or the lowest priority among all of the suitableSS-blocks.

At S154: determining whether the number of the suitable SS-blocks withthe highest priority or the lowest priority is greater than one.

If the number is greater than one, the process proceeds to S155;otherwise, the process proceeds to S156.

At S155: randomly selecting one suitable SS-block from the suitableSS-blocks with the highest priority or the lowest priority as the targetSS-block.

The process proceeds to S157.

At S156: taking the suitable SS-block with the highest priority or thelowest priority as the target SS-block.

At S157: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 7 , a flow chart of a seventh embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure,where the specified parameter of each SS-block includes an index, andthe second predetermined condition includes a condition that the indexof a target SS-block is the smallest or the greatest. This embodiment isan extension of the first embodiment of the paging method of the presentdisclosure, hence the same content as the first embodiment of the pagingmethod of the present disclosure is not described again herein. Themethod may include the following blocks.

At S161: measuring SS-blocks to obtain signal qualities of theSS-blocks.

At S162: selecting suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on thesignal qualities.

At S163: selecting the suitable SS-block with the smallest index or thelargest index from the suitable SS-blocks as the target SS-block.

At S164: transmitting a paging response message to the base stationutilizing the RACH resource and/or the random access preamblecorresponding to the target SS-block.

Referring to FIG. 8 , a flow chart of an eighth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure.The method may include the following blocks before S14.

At S15: receiving a paging indication from the base station.

The paging indication may be included in downlink control information orcarried by a non-scheduled physical channel (e.g., PBCH) or physicaldownlink shared channel.

The paging indication may be a hash applied to an identifier of a pagedUE, a truncation of the identifier of the paged UE, an identifier or abitmap of a paging group where the paged UE locates. The bitmap is abinary number, and each bit of the bitmap corresponds to a paging group.The value of each bit of the bitmap indicates whether the correspondingpaging group includes the paged UE. For example, if the value of acertain bit of the bitmap is 0, it indicates that there is no UE beingpaged in the paging group corresponding to the bit having the value of0; if the value of a certain bit of the bitmap is 1, it indicates thatat least one UE is paged in the paging group corresponding to the bithaving the value of 1.

Referring to FIG. 9 , a flow chart of a ninth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure.The method may include the following blocks before S11.

At S10: receiving information of the SS-blocks.

The information of each SS-block includes the specified parameter, thecorresponding downlink beam, the RACH resource, and/or the random accesspreamble.

If the specified parameter of each SS-block includes the priority, andthe mapping relationship between the priority and the index of eachSS-block is explicitly defined, the information of each SS-block may notinclude its own priority.

Referring to FIG. 10 , a flow chart of a tenth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the first embodiment of the paging method of the present disclosure.The method may include the following blocks after S14.

At S16: receiving the paging message transmitted by the base stationutilizing the downlink beam corresponding to the target SS-block.

At S17: performing a random access to establish a connection with thebase station when the paging message includes its own identifier.

The following is a simulation result of an embodiment of the pagingmethod of the present disclosure. In this embodiment, the SS-blocks aredivided into two groups, the first group consists of even-indexedSS-blocks, the second group consists of odd-indexed SS-blocks, and thefirst group has a higher priority than the second group. The secondpredetermined condition includes a condition that the index of thetarget SS-block is the smallest while the priority of the targetSS-block is the highest.

In the simulation, L SS-blocks are configured in the cell, and the LSS-blocks have indices ranging from 0 to L−1. Each SS-block respectivelycorresponds to at least one downlink beam, and the index of eachdownlink beam is the index of the corresponding SS-block.

The number of the UEs which responds to each PI is N, wherein N isrelated to the definition and the configuration of the PI. For instance,in an extreme case, the PI is set to be a P-RNTI scrambled DCI, and allthe UEs camps on the cell should respond to the PI; in another extremecase, the PI is set to be an exact ID of the paged UE, and only one UEwith the same ID may respond to the PI.

Two cases in which the cell is configured with L=8 or L=64 SS-blocks arerespectively considered. For the case L=8, N ranges from 1 to 50, andeach UE is respectively randomly assigned with 2 or 3 suitable SS-blockswhich have indices ranges from 0 to 7. For the case L=64, N ranges from1 to 200, and each UE is respectively randomly assigned with 2, 3 or 4suitable SS-blocks which have indices ranges from 0 to 63. In bothcases, it is assumed that the signal qualities of the suitable SS-blocksare progressively decreased.

The simulation result of the number of distinct responded beams ofdifferent beam selection schemes with L=8 is shown in FIG. 11 , and thesimulation result of the number of distinct responded beams of differentbeam selection schemes with L=64 is shown in FIG. 12 . In FIG. 11 andFIG. 12 , the number (N) of the responded UEs for a PI is used asX-axis, and the number of distinct responded beams (the downlink beamsselected by the UE for transmitting paging messages) by UEs is used asY-axis. The scheme in the related art is taken as the baseline scheme,in which the UE selects the SS-block with the best signal quality as thetarget SS-block.

As shown in FIG. 11 , for the case L=8, in comparison with the baselinescheme, when each UE has 2 suitable SS-blocks, more than one distinctresponded beam can be reduced on average; when each UE has 3 suitableSS-blocks, more than two distinct responded beams can be reduced onaverage. As shown in FIG. 12 , for the case L=64, in comparison with thebaseline scheme, when each UE has 2 suitable SS-blocks, about 8 distinctresponded beams can be reduced; when each UE has 3 suitable SS-blocks,about 16 distinct responded beams can be reduced; when each UE has 4suitable SS-blocks, about 22 distinct responded beams can be reduced.

It should be noted that, in this simulation, the suitable SS-blocks arerandomly assigned to each UE without any correlation among them, thusthe performance obtained by the simulation indicates the lower bound. Inpractical applications, correlations may exist among the suitable signalblocks of the UE, and better performance of the method provided in thisembodiment can be expected.

Referring to FIG. 13 , a flow chart of an eleventh embodiment of apaging method of the present disclosure is depicted. An execution mainbody of the eleventh embodiment is a base station. The base station isconnected to a core network and performs wireless communication with aUE, and provides communication coverage for a corresponding geographicalarea. The base station may be a macro base station, a micro basestation, a pico base station, or a femtocell. In some embodiments, thebase station may also be referred as a radio base station, an accesspoint, a Node B, an evolved Node B (eNodeB, eNB), a gNB, or othersuitable terms. As shown in FIG. 13 , the method may include thefollowing blocks.

At S21: transmitting a paging indication to a UE.

The paging indication may be included in downlink control information orcarried by a non-scheduled physical channel (e.g., PBCH) or physicaldownlink shared channel.

The paging indication may be a hash applied to an identifier of a pagedUE, a truncation of the identifier of the paged UE, an identifier or abitmap of a paging group where the paged UE locates. The bitmap is abinary number, and each bit of the bitmap corresponds to a paging group.The value of each bit of the bitmap indicates whether the correspondingpaging group includes the paged UE. For example, if the value of acertain bit of the bitmap is 0, it indicates that there is no UE beingpaged in the paging group corresponding to the bit having the value of0; if the value of a certain bit of the bitmap is 1, it indicates thatthere are UE(s) being paged in the paging group corresponding to the bithaving the value of 1.

At S22: receiving a paging response message transmitted by the UEutilizing a RACH resource and/or a random access preamble correspondingto a target SS-block.

The target SS-block is selected by the UE from suitable SS-blocks, thesuitable SS-blocks are selected by the UE from SS-blocks based on signalqualities of the SS-blocks, and the signal qualities of the SS-blocksare obtained by the UE through measuring the SS-blocks.

Each SS-block includes PSS, SSS and PBCH. Each SS-block respectivelycorresponds to a downlink beam as well as a RACH resource and/or arandom access preamble. Each SS-block may be transmitted on itscorresponding downlink beam(s) and associated with its correspondingRACH resource and/or random access preamble. Different SS-blockscorrespond to different RACH resources and/or random access preambles,and the downlink beams corresponding to different SS-blocks may be inthe same direction or in different directions.

The signal qualities of the suitable SS-blocks may satisfy a firstpredetermined condition, and a specified parameter of the targetSS-block may satisfy a second predetermined condition. The signalqualities of the SS-blocks may be related to the UE, that is, for thesame SS-block, its signal quality measured by different UEs may bedifferent. The specified parameter of each SS-block and the secondpredetermined condition may be irrelevant to the UE. That is, fordifferent UEs, the second predetermined condition and the specifiedparameter of each SS-block received by different UEs are the same.

At S23: transmitting a paging message utilizing the downlink beamcorresponding to the target SS-block in response to the paging responsemessage.

The base station may confirm the target SS-block selected by the UEaccording to the RACH resource and/or the preamble carrying the pagingresponse message, and further confirm the downlink beam corresponding tothe target SS-block.

For more detailed descriptions and feasible extensions, reference may bemade to the corresponding contents of the above-mentioned embodiments.

Through the implementation of this embodiment, the UE firstly selectsthe suitable SS-blocks from the SS-blocks based on the signal qualities,and then selects the target SS-block from the suitable SS-blocks basedon the specified parameters irrelevant to the UE. Since the specifiedparameters irrelevant to the UE are utilized during the selection, forthe UEs which are in the same paging group and located in similarwireless environment (at least parts of the suitable SS-blocks are thesame while the SS-blocks with the best signal quality are different), itis possible to select the same target SS-block in the present disclosurewhile different target SS-blocks in the related art, thereby reducingthe number of the downlink beams for transmitting the paging message,without being affected by the grouping mode of the paging groups.

Referring to FIG. 14 , a flow chart of a twelfth embodiment of a pagingmethod of the present disclosure is depicted. This embodiment is basedon the eleventh embodiment of the paging method of the presentdisclosure. The method may include the following blocks before S22.

At S20: transmitting information of the SS-blocks to the UE.

The information of each SS-block may include the specified parameter,the corresponding downlink beam, the RACH resource, and/or the randomaccess preamble.

The specified parameter of each SS-block may include a priority. TheSS-blocks may be divided into at least two groups. Wherein the SS-blocksin the same group are assigned with a same priority, and the SS-blocksin different groups are assigned with different priorities.

If the specified parameter of each SS-block includes the priority, andthe mapping relationship between the priority and the index of eachSS-block is explicitly defined, the information of each SS-block may notinclude its own priority.

Referring to FIG. 15 , a schematic diagram of the structure of a firstembodiment of a paging device of the present disclosure is depicted. Thefirst embodiment of the paging device of the present disclosure mayinclude a processor 110 and a communication circuit 120, wherein theprocessor 110 is connected to the communication circuit 120.

The communication circuit 120 is configured to transmit and receive userdata, and is an interface for the paging device to communicate withother communication devices.

The processor 110 is configured to control the operation of the pagingdevice. The processor 110 may also be referred to as a CPU (centralprocessing unit). The processor 110 may be an integrated circuit chiphaving signal processing capability. The processor 110 may also be ageneral purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP), anapplication specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field-programmablegate array (FPGA). The processor 110 may also be other programmablelogic device, a discrete gate logic device, a transistor logic device,or a discrete hardware component. The general purpose processor may be amicroprocessor, or the processor may also be any conventional processor.

The processor 110 is configured to execute instructions to implement themethods provided in any of the first to the tenth embodiments of thepresent disclosure and any of their non-conflicting combination.

In this embodiment, the paging device may be a UE, or a separatecomponent integrated into the UE, such as a baseband chip.

Referring to FIG. 16 , a schematic diagram of the structure of a secondembodiment of a paging device of the present disclosure is depicted. Thesecond embodiment of the paging device of the present disclosureincludes a processor 210 and a communication circuit 220, wherein theprocessor 210 is connected to the communication circuit 220.

The communication circuit 220 is configured to transmit and receive userdata, and is an interface for the paging device to communicate withother communication devices.

The processor 210 is configured to control the operation of the pagingdevice. The processor 210 may also be referred to as a CPU (centralprocessing unit). The processor 210 may be an integrated circuit chiphaving signal processing capability. The processor 210 may also be ageneral purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP), anapplication specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field-programmablegate array (FPGA). The processor 210 may also be another programmablelogic device, a discrete gate logic device, a transistor logic device,or a discrete hardware component. The general purpose processor may be amicroprocessor, or the processor may also be any conventional processor.

The processor 210 is configured to execute instructions to implement themethods provided in the eleventh or the twelfth embodiments of thepaging method of the present disclosure.

In this embodiment, the paging device may be a base station, or aseparate component integrated into the base station, such as a basebandboard.

Referring to FIG. 17 , a schematic diagram of the structure of a firstembodiment of a readable storage medium of the present disclosure isdepicted. The first embodiment of the readable storage medium of thepresent disclosure includes a storage 310 in which instructions arestored, and the methods provided in any of the first to the tenthembodiments of the paging method of the present disclosure and any oftheir non-conflicting combination are implemented when the instructionsare executed.

The storage 310 may include a read-only memory (ROM), a random accessmemory (RAM), a flash memory, a hard disk, an optical disk, etc.

In this embodiment, the readable storage medium may be a standalonecomponent, or be integrated into a UE, or be a component in a UE, suchas a baseband chip.

Referring to FIG. 18 , a schematic diagram of the structure of a secondembodiment of a readable storage medium of the present disclosure isdepicted. The second embodiment of the readable storage medium of thepresent disclosure includes a storage 410 in which instructions arestored, and the methods provided in the eleventh or the twelfthembodiments of the paging method of the present disclosure isimplemented when the instructions are executed.

The storage 410 may include a read-only memory (ROM), a random accessmemory (RAM), a flash memory, a hard disk, an optical disk, etc.

In this embodiment, the readable storage medium may be a standalonecomponent, or be integrated into a base station, or be a component in abase station, such as a baseband board.

In the embodiments provided by the present disclosure, it is to beunderstood that the disclosed methods and devices can be implemented inother ways. For example, the device embodiments described above aremerely illustrative; the division of the modules or units is merely adivision of logical functions, and can be divided in other ways such ascombining or integrating multiple units or components with anothersystem when being implemented; and some features can be ignored or notexecuted. In another aspect, the coupling such as direct coupling andcommunication connection which is shown or discussed can be implementedthrough some interfaces, and the indirect coupling and the communicationconnection between devices or units can be electrical, mechanical, or inany other suitable means.

The units described as separated components can or cannot be physicallyseparate, and the components shown as units can or cannot be physicalunits, that is, the components shown as units can be located in oneplace or distributed over a plurality of network elements. It ispossible to select some or all of the units in accordance with theactual needs to achieve the object of the embodiments.

In addition, each of the functional units in each of the embodiments ofthe present disclosure can be integrated in one processing unit. Eachunit can be physically exists alone, or two or more units can beintegrated in one unit. The above-mentioned integrated unit can beimplemented either in the form of hardware, or in the form of softwarefunctional units.

The integrated unit can be stored in a computer-readable storage mediumif it is implemented in the form of a software functional unit and soldor utilized as a separate product. Based on this understanding, thetechnical solution of the present disclosure, either essentially or inpart, contributes to the related art, or all or a part of the technicalsolution can be embodied in the form of a software product. The softwareproduct is stored in a storage medium, which includes a number ofinstructions for enabling a computer device (which can be a personalcomputer, a server, a network device, etc.) or a processor to executeall or a part of the blocks of the methods described in each of theembodiments of the present disclosure. The above-mentioned storagemedium includes a variety of media such as a USB disk, a mobile harddisk, a read-only memory (ROM), a random access memory (RAM), a magneticdisk, and an optical disk which is capable of storing program codes.

The foregoing is merely embodiments of the present disclosure, and isnot intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure. Anyequivalent structure or flow transformation made based on thespecification and the accompanying drawings of the present disclosure,or any direct or indirect applications of the present disclosure onother related fields, shall all be covered within the protection of thepresent disclosure.

What is claimed is:
 1. A paging method, comprising: measuring, by a userequipment, synchronization signal blocks to obtain signal qualities ofthe synchronization signal blocks, wherein each synchronization signalblock respectively corresponds to at least one of downlink beams, arandom access channel resource, or a random access preamble; selecting,by the user equipment, suitable synchronization signal blocks from thesynchronization signal blocks based on the signal qualities, wherein thesignal qualities of the suitable synchronization signal blocks satisfiesa first predetermined condition; transmitting a random access channel(RACH) resource and/or the random access preamble corresponding to atarget synchronization signal block, wherein the target synchronizationsignal block is selected from the suitable synchronization signal blocksdepending on a specified parameter of the target synchronization signalblock satisfying a second predetermined condition; and transmitting apaging response message to a base station utilizing the random accesschannel (RACH) resource or the random access preamble corresponding tothe suitable synchronization signal blocks, wherein the paging responsemessage is configured to instruct the base station to transmit thepaging message utilizing the downlink beam corresponding to the targetsynchronization signal block.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein thefirst predetermined condition includes a condition that the signalquality of each suitable synchronization signal block is greater than apredetermined threshold.
 3. The method of claim 2, wherein the firstpredetermined condition is locally stored in the user equipment, or istransmitted from a base station.
 4. The method of claim 1 wherein eachof the synchronization signal blocks comprises a primary synchronizationsignal (PSS), a secondary synchronization signal (SSS), and a physicalbroadcast channel (PBCH), and each of the synchronization signal blockscorresponds to at least one downlink beam as well as the RACH resourceand/or the random access preamble.
 5. The method of claim 4, whereineach of the synchronization signal blocks is transmitted on itscorresponding downlink beam and associated with its corresponding RACHresource and/or preamble.
 6. The method of claim 4, wherein differentsynchronization signal blocks correspond to different RACH resourcesand/or random access preambles, and the downlink beams corresponding todifferent synchronization signal blocks in the same direction or indifferent directions.
 7. The method of claim 1, wherein the userequipment is in RRC_IDLE or RRC_INACTIVE state.
 8. The method of claim1, wherein each synchronization signal block comprises a specifiedparameter, and the specified parameter of each synchronization signalblock is defined by a core network or a base station for each suitablesynchronization signal block.
 9. The method of claim 8, wherein thespecified parameter comprises at least one of a priority and/or an indexof the synchronization signal block.
 10. The method of claim 9, whereinthe index of each synchronization signal block is utilized todistinguish different synchronization signal blocks from each other. 11.The method of claim 1, wherein the measuring step, the selecting stepand the transmitting step are periodically performed.
 12. The method ofclaim 1, wherein the specified parameter comprises at least one of apriority and an index of the synchronization signal block, and thesecond predetermined condition comprises a condition that one suitablesynchronization signal block with the smallest index from the suitablesynchronization signal blocks with the highest priority is selected asthe target synchronization signal block.
 13. The method of claim 1,wherein the specified parameter comprises at least one of a priority andan index of the synchronization signal block, and the secondpredetermined condition comprises a condition that one suitablesynchronization signal block with the greatest index from suitablesynchronization signal blocks with the highest priority is selected asthe target synchronization signal block.
 14. The method of claim 1,wherein the specified parameter comprises at least one of a priority andan index of the synchronization signal block, and the secondpredetermined condition comprises a condition that one suitablesynchronization signal block with the smallest index from suitablesynchronization signal blocks with the lowest priority is selected asthe target synchronization signal block.
 15. The method of claim 1,wherein the specified parameter comprises at least one of a priority andan index of the synchronization signal block, and the secondpredetermined condition comprises a condition that one suitablesynchronization signal block with the greatest index from suitablesynchronization signal blocks with the lowest priority is selected asthe target synchronization signal block.
 16. The method of claim 1,wherein the specified parameter comprises at least one of a priority andan index of the synchronization signal block, and the secondpredetermined condition comprises a condition that one suitablesynchronization signal block with the smallest index or the greatestindex is selected as the target synchronization signal block.
 17. Themethod of claim 1, wherein the signal qualities of the synchronizationsignal blocks measured by different user equipments are different.
 18. Apaging device, comprising a processor and a communication circuit,wherein the processor is connected to the communication circuit; and theprocessor is configured to execute instructions to implement operationscomprising: measuring synchronization signal blocks to obtain signalqualities of the synchronization signal blocks, wherein eachsynchronization signal block respectively corresponds to at least one ofdownlink beams, a random access channel resource, or a random accesspreamble; selecting suitable synchronization signal blocks from thesynchronization signal blocks based on the signal qualities, wherein thesignal qualities of the suitable synchronization signal blocks satisfiesa first predetermined condition; transmitting a random access channel(RACH) resource and/or the random access preamble corresponding to atarget synchronization signal block, wherein the target synchronizationsignal block is selected from the suitable synchronization signal blocksdepending on a specified parameter of the target synchronization signalblock satisfying a second predetermined condition; and transmitting apaging response message to a base station utilizing the random accesschannel (RACH) resource or the random access preamble corresponding tothe suitable synchronization signal blocks, wherein the paging responsemessage is configured to instruct the base station to transmit thepaging message utilizing the downlink beam corresponding to the targetsynchronization signal block.
 19. A non-transitory readable storagemedium, having instructions stored therein, wherein the instructions areexecutable by a processor to perform operations comprising: measuringsynchronization signal blocks to obtain signal qualities of thesynchronization signal blocks, wherein each synchronization signal blockrespectively corresponds to at least one of downlink beams, a randomaccess channel resource, or a random access preamble; selecting suitablesynchronization signal blocks from the synchronization signal blocksbased on the signal qualities, wherein the signal qualities of thesuitable synchronization signal blocks satisfies a first predeterminedcondition; transmitting a random access channel (RACH) resource and/orthe random access preamble corresponding to a target synchronizationsignal block, wherein the target synchronization signal block isselected from the suitable synchronization signal blocks depending on aspecified parameter of the target synchronization signal blocksatisfying a second predetermined condition; and transmitting a pagingresponse message to a base station utilizing the random access channel(RACH) resource or the random access preamble corresponding to thesuitable synchronization signal blocks, wherein the paging responsemessage is configured to instruct the base station to transmit thepaging message utilizing the downlink beam corresponding to the targetsynchronization signal block.